Computers Take Over!

                  

English 3332 students:

For our Friday, April 1, blog, please read “Contemporary Period: 1945 to the Present,” pp. 950-53 in our textbook, before you post your comment of at least two well developed paragraphs. Please write about the influence of computer technology in America after World War II, drawing upon both what the textbook's editors say about this topic and on what you already know about it.

After you post your comment, please reply in one well-developed paragraph to at least one of the other students' comments.

Viewing for Monday:

Arthur Miller. Death of a Salesman. ASU library streaming video.

As was the case for The Iceman Cometh last week, watching (and listening to) a relatively unabridged production of the play, which is linked below, is essentially the same as reading it, so for Death of a Salesman, we will rely on the video. It is about one hour and 45 minutes long.

Instructions for watching the film in the ASU library's streaming video collection:

1. Click on this link: ASU library's streaming video of Death of a Salesman

2. Type in your ASU username and password.

3. When the web page for the video opens, click on the triangle play icon.

4. Enjoy!


Have a relaxing weekend,

Dr. K

The Iceman Cometh

               
                     Eugene O'Neill at rehearsal for The Iceman Cometh in 1946

English 3332 students:

This week we will not have a written assignment for the blog because Friday, March 25, is a school holiday. But at home or wherever you can access the Internet over this long weekend, you should put aside the time to watch the 1960 film production of Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh, starring Jason Robards and Robert Redford.

The running time of the video is a bit more than three hours, and you might want to divide your viewing time unless you have that stretch of time available in one sitting. But please keep in mind that you should watch the last hour (or more, if possible) in one sitting so that you will understand the suspense and intensity in the play's climactic conclusion.

Instructions for watching the film in the ASU library's streaming video collection:

1. Click on this:  ASU library link for The Iceman Cometh

2. Type in your ASU username and password.

3. When the web page for the video opens, click on the triangle play icon.

4. Enjoy!

In the play, you will find unfamiliar slang from the New York City area that was used a century ago. Here is a list of terms and definitions that you should review carefully before you watch the film:

1. the iceman: a delivery man who supplied people with blocks of ice for their iceboxes (old fashioned refrigerators that were large coolers needing a steady supply of ice blocks). The jokes about a wife having an affair with the iceman, made by several characters in the play, would be similar today to jokes about a wife having an affair with a UPS delivery man or a cable guy.

2. to croak: to die or to kill

3. a tart: a promiscuous woman (in today's slang, a slut)

4. a ball: a shot of liquor

5. a soak, souse, stew bum, or tank: an alcoholic

6. pie-eyed, paralyzed, oreyed, or stinko: drunk

7. a nail: a sexually transmitted disease

8. a pipe dream: an impossible fantasy (alluding to the hallucinations of opium users, who smoke opium with a pipe.)

9. bughouse: crazy

10. a yap: a stupid person or a mouth

11. a periodical: a drinking binge

12. a grifter: a petty criminal, con artist

13. a bazoo: mouth

14. a drummer: a salesman

15. bejees: short for "By Jesus;" today, this slang expression is shortened to "jeez" or "gee"

16. the Movement: an anarchist group of terrorists who kill innocent people with bombs to send a message to society at large.

Have a great three-day weekend,

Dr. K

Babylon Revisited and Roman Fever

                   
                              F. Scott Fitzgerald and his daughter

English 3332 students:

For your blog of Friday, March 11, please post a comment of two well-developed paragraphs comparing and contrasting the symbolism attached to Honoria and Barbara in, respectively, F. Scott Fitzgerald's "Babylon Revisited," (710-27), and Edith Wharton's "Roman Fever" (546-55). In your comment please include at least two quotations from each story.

After you post your comment, please reply to at least one of the other students' comments.

Have a relaxing and fun spring break,
Prof. K

"Hugh Selwyn Mauberley"

                               

English 3332 students:

For our Friday, March 4, blog, please post a comment of at least two well-developed paragraphs about the connections you see between the ideas in "Hugh Selwyn Mauberley" (626-35) and those that characterized Pound's intellectual development according to this 20 minute video biography of Ezra Pound: link for streaming video (After you click on the link, please click on "Part of the Films on Demand collection, access requires login to the proxy server." Then type in your ASU username and password. If you have problems opening the video, you are probably using Internet Explorer instead of Google Chrome, so clost the former and open the blog page in the latter.)

In your comment, please include at least three quotations from "Hugh Selwyn Mauberley."

After you post your comment, please reply in one well-developed paragraph to at least one of the others students' comments.

Reminder for Monday: Susan Glaspell. “Trifles,” 585-96; Sherwood Anderson’s “Hands,” 613-18; and Katherine Anne Porter’s “Flowering Judas,” 727-38.

Have a great weekend,
Prof. K